Promotor Pathway® Model

LAYC’s Promotor Pathway® is a long-term client management intervention model for disconnected and disengaged youth facing multiple obstacles that prevent them from accessing resources and achieving educational, employment, and healthy living goals. This evidence based model allows Promotores to work on a one-on-one basis with each youth to remove barriers, proactively encourage participation in a broad set of LAYC services, and connect them to other needed resources within the community so they may make a successful transition to adulthood. With a strong theory of change and evidence of success, LAYC has created the Promotor Pathway® National Network to scale and replicate this innovative model across the country.

Our Youth

Our goal is to serve youth ages 14 to 24 with a multiplicity of challenges, such as lack of education, homelessness, trauma, substance abuse, and court involvement. Our youth are often on the verge or already disconnected from school, employment, and community connections. The LAYC developed a Risk Screening Tool that allows Promotors to assess the barriers in a young person’s life, allowing us to identify, outreach, and serve those experiencing the highest level of risks.

Our Approach

The Promotor Pathway® model focuses on cultivating and maintaining a lasting, trusting relationship with the youth to achieve success in education, employment, and healthy behaviors. Promotores support youth through “small wins” and provide crisis intervention in order to remove obstacles and engage youth in a broad set of programs and services in the community. Disconnected youth have a variety of risk factors that cannot be quickly addressed, and the long-term relationship, four to six years on average, enables Promotores to create lasting change.

Our Team

Promotores are experienced youth workers with various educational backgrounds, but all with extensive knowledge of community resources. They uniquely combine the roles of mentor and case manager in a way that fosters transformational relationships with young people. Promotores complete extensive and ongoing training to best serve their youth. Promotores maintain a maximum caseload of 20 young people, ensuring quality services and individualized support for each and every one of the youth they serve.

Our Impact

Success within the Promotor Pathway® is defined as youth achievement of stability, connectedness, and self-agency. Specifically, each youth working with a Promotor will be tracked on progress toward three goals:

Increased academic success

Transition to work or completion of vocational/technical education

Improvement in practice of healthy behaviors and decreases in risk-taking behaviors

Our Evaluation

In 2016, The Promotor Pathway® has been rigorously evaluated through a randomized control trial, multi-year study conducted by Urban Institute. The evaluation tracked 476 youth over 18 months to analyze the effectiveness of the model and revealed significant positive outcomes on school engagement, pregnancy prevention, and housing.

Contact

If you would like to learn more about the Promotor Pathway in the Washington Metro area, please contact Shayna Scholnick, Promotor Pathway Director at Shayna@layc-dc.org

The Promotor Pathway® is headquartered at LAYC’s DC site, 1419 Columbia Road, NW, Washington, DC 20009. Promotores are stationed at LAYC’s DC, Prince George’s and Montgomery County sites, as well as at partner schools.